HARTFORD  Gun control advocates were buoyed Thursday by a federal court decision in Hartford that upholds Connecticut's toughest-in-the-nation assault weapons ban, calling it a constitutionally valid means of balancing gun rights and the government's interest in reducing gun violence.

"The court concludes that the legislation is constitutional," senior U.S. District Judge Alfred V. Covello wrote in a decision published late Thursday. "While the act burdens the plaintiffs' Second Amendment rights, it is substantially related to the important governmental interest of public safety and crime control."

The legislature enacted comprehensive restrictions on ownership of semiautomatic weapons and ammunition early last year in the emotionally charged weeks following the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown. Troubled gunman killed 20 first-grade students and six women with a now-banned AR-15 Bushmaster assault rifle his mother bought.

A coalition of gun owners, gun sellers and sports shooting organizations sued in U.S. District Court to block enforcement of the law and overturn it on constitutional grounds. The plaintiffs argued that the state's ban of 138 weapons and large-capacity ammunition magazines is vague, discriminates among different categories of gun users and, most significantly, infringes on their Second Amendment right to gun ownership.

I now understand how and why it was that Jews in Europe surrendered everything without a fight and then dutifully lined up for death camps and mass graves.

We're living a repeat - even though we're armed, we line up in order to be systematically disarmed while the police are militarized and the government and media declares Conservatives to be a threat to security and the state.

Connecticut (along with New Jersey, New York and Illinois) is one of the "top 10" states that people are leaving. It's probably not entirely because of things like their new gun control laws -- but this sure doesn't help them retain taxpayers.

What a specious argument. We now have enough evidence to show that broad gun liberties, not quite up to what we have via our Bill of Rights in the Constitution, improve "gun" violence rates.

Furthermore, what do you do about a government that sells guns to Mexican drug gangs? What do you do about a government interested in controlling and suppressing speech via targeted IRS tax-harassment? What do you do about a government interested in dictating to its people?

If the government protected the right to bear arms the same way they protected the “right” to an abortion you would see:

1) Guns and gun safety taught in schools
2) Schools would hand out bullets
3) Children as young as 14 could buy guns without their parents knowledge or consent
4) No restrictions on gun sales regardless of mental illness
5) No registrations on gun sales
6) Gun store clerks would tell customers how to violate any gun laws
7) Gun control advocates wouldn’t be allowed to protest within 100’ of gun stores
8) There would be laws against the media publishing the names of gun owners.

More children (people younger than a month old) are killed by abortion than guns.

From the judge's decision in the linked article: "... a constitutionally valid means of balancing gun rights and the government's interest in reducing gun violence."

From the Heller decision: We know of no other enumerated constitutional right whose core protection has been subjected to a freestanding interest-balancing approach. The very enumeration of the right takes out of the hands of governmenteven the Third Branch of Governmentthe power to decide on a case-by-case basis whether the right is really worth insisting upon. A constitutional guarantee subject to future judges assessments of its usefulness is no constitutional guarantee at all.

All I know is that the NRA helped rush the NY law into Federal court and the lawyers did a lousy job arguing. Because they rushed this into Fed court, they completely screwed up a couple of cases winding their way through State court which were doing quite well up until Skretny’s ruling.

Judge Covello has just issued his decision. Unfortunately, we did not fare well. Judge Covello denied our motion and granted the States in its entirety. Not totally unexpected, and we were prepared all along for this possibility. CCDL is in this for the long haul, and you can be sure we will be filing an appeal forthwith.

“government’s interest in reducing gun violence”
No such animal exists. guns are by nature passive. and are completely devoid of human attributes. they are made of wood, metal, plastic. this is result of failing to educate. the judge is a stupid moron.

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